Unincorporated Minds

Mugger gets owned by 2 hot girls then gets mugged

2011-05-12T10:52:00.000-05:00

Title says it all. Fat mugger gets owned by two hot college girls.

The ending is classic. You will laugh like crazy.

Please share this with everyone you know.

Autorun.inf is useless in Windows XP, Vista, and 7

2011-05-04T11:14:00.001-05:00

This is a note to USB Developers: It appears that the autorun.inf file is useless in computers running Win XP SP3 or higher. Recent Microsoft updates have kept the autoplay feature, but disabled the autorun feature in XP SP3 and Vista. It is also set this way by default in Windows 7.

If the user is motivated to do so, there are work-arounds. However, promotional USB developers must keep this in mind as a statistically large portion of users will no longer be able to use their USB drives as effectively.

I am putting this here so that it may save you time trying to find a solution when this happens to you.

I will also update this blog if I find a valid solution other than ensuring the root directory of your USB only contains a file that say CLICKME.

Hope this helps.

This was originally posted on my tech blog Priceless Geek.

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ICVerify “Cannot Start Program” error & Set File

2011-05-04T02:02:00.001-05:00

I had the pleasure of working with ICVerify 4 again the other day. This time I had a machine on which I was getting an error that went Something like “Cannot start program to due to an error.”

If you have dealt with this program, then you know it is easier to uninstall and reinstall than to try and troubleshoot it. That is the path on which I journeyed. It failed to take me home.

After some frustrating time spent on it, I discovered the uninstall features did not remove the hook into the SQL database. Once I deleted the reference on the SQL Server, I was able to run the program without incident.

Also, if you did not know this, you can export the ICVERIFY.SET file from a working installation and copy it over to your new installation. You just have to open the ICVerify setup program and export it from there. It takes two seconds and can save you some time if you are manually setting up your configuration.

What are some of your experiences and/or tips with this program?

This was originally publish on my tech blog Priceless Geek.

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ICVerify and Windows 7

2011-05-04T02:01:00.001-05:00

I had intended to put this topic on my previous ICVerify post, but I felt it needed its own entry.

Getting ICVerify (I was using v4) to work on Windows 7 is pretty simple.

When I first installed it, the program would fatal error when the program called the receipt printer.

However, the solution is NOT reinstalling.

Just go into the folder where ICverify.exe resides and Right click on ICVerify.exe.
Go to properties
Go to the Compatibility tab
Check “Run this program compatibility mode for:” Windows XP SP3
Also, check “Run this program as administrator.”

From there everything should cooperate.

Another user is already logged on Error

If ICVerify crashes and you cannot log back in because you get an error message stating that the user name you are loggin in as is already loged in, don’t panic. This is also an easy, quick fix.

Open the ICVerify User Manager. Log in.
Go to the Log On Tab
Select the option that is not User manager from the drop down box.
You should see your user ID showing as logged in.
Select that line, then click the log out button.

You should now be able to log back in.

Hope that helps. Do you have any tips or tricks for this program you would like to share? Please comment if so.

This was originally publish on my tech blog Priceless Geek.

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HELP me get an A, plus: Looking for interesting blogs to read

2011-05-03T21:14:00.001-05:00

Just a couple quick questions for you.

Do you have any suggestions?

Do you blog? What is your blog address?

Also, if you want to help me get an A in my one of my WSU classes:

Please fill this short survey out.

If you aren’t reading this at Unincorporated Minds you should be.

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I Haven’t forgotten about you

2011-04-21T19:21:00.001-05:00

This post is to update my precious readers that I have not abandoned this blog. School and work have been hectic, but I will be updating this regularly moving forward.

Also, Check out my business blog and my weight loss blog.

What do you think of my new layout?

See you then,

Mike

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Amazon.com won't let me buy 2 phones even though the service provider has approved me and I have the money

2010-10-25T18:26:00.000-05:00

This is my letter to Amazon.com's Executive customer service email line (ecr@amazon.com). It has been a long day of dealing with uncaring folk on the phone. This letter outlines my plight.

Hello,

I am writing you as a last resort. I have had a horendous experience with Amazon and Sprint today.

I placed my original order 103-5789548-06xxxxx at around 11am 10-25-10. Shortly after, I received an email stating I needed to call Sprint. I called Sprint to get credit approval. I was approved for the phones and was Sprint would notify Amazon of my approval. Sprint made an error and informe Sprint I had a previous account.

I have not ever been a Sprint customer. At this rate, I never will be. In 2008, I did attempt to purchase a cell phone from them. I canceled the order after they wanted an insane amount as a deposit. I called Sprint to get this sorted out. They say that I am a new customer and the agent shouldn't have appened my new account to that old account from the canceled order. Sprint confirms that I am approved for the phones.

I have spoken to about 14 different Amazon employees about this. I have had it escalated. Amazon has canceled the order. I am informed there is no way to reverse this. I have tried to climb the authority ladder on the phone, but came to dead ends. One customer service agent even told me that there was no one higher than him. Even though he admitted he was not the CEO. He informed me that as far as I am to be concerned, he is the most important person at Amazon and what he says is final. His name was John B. out of a call center in Huntington, VA. He suggested I just re-order the phones.

I explained that I cannot just reorder the phones. To qualify for the price on Amazon.com, I must be a new customer to Sprint. Since Amazon opens an account in my name with Sprint to get approval for the service plan, I am now a customer with Sprint. Sprint shows that the order for the phones is complete. Sprint cannot cancel a 3rd Party order. There is an obvious disconnect between Sprint and Amazon.

I tested my luck anyway. I tried to reorder the phones. Sprint customer service informed me that they approved the phones, but that due to a system glitch I may be rejected anyway. That order number is 103-8844314-372xxxx. I was rejected as the Sprint warned. Amazon canceled that order too.

So here I am, ready and willing to give Amazon $xxx and Sprint over $xxx/month, but I still cannot complete the order due to computer glitches. I cannot get a customer service agent that understand customer service or solving a problem outside a script.

I have never had any problems with Amazon.com before. I am even a seller on Amazon.com. However, after this experience, I am about to swear off both Sprint and Amazon.

Please help me solve this problem.

Mike Brooks

I certainly hope that I can get this resolved. I will update this with the results (or lack thereof).

Lessons Learned with a Toshiba Satellite Laptop: 10-FC12-0017 error

2010-07-07T00:52:00.001-05:00

Sometimes repairs stop being about a quick fix and become a vendetta. This is one of those instances.

Recently, a Toshiba Satellite L305 was given to me for repair. The OS had been accidentally removed, but the person had the Vista 32-bit recovery disks. I figured no problem, I can do this in a hour. Well, the recovery went find until disk 2 went into the recovery process and hit about 30%. I received a 10-FC12-0017 error. A search of the net found nexperts (net experts) divided between bad recovery disks or bad hard drive.

The hard drive wasn’t acting or sounding bad. Plus ,my friend had said the only reason she ran the recovery disks originally was because the touchpad wasn’t working. It’s ok to laugh. I assumed the HDD was fine since she didn’t complain of operating issues. So I figured it was the recovery DVD’s, as they had some serious scratches on them even after I cleaned them.

The L305 had a 64-bit processor so I figured, let me try my OEM 64-bit Vista disk. It actually installed fine with no errors. However, I had no valid product code and the product key on the bottom wasn’t validating. So I knew I had to use the recovery disks.

Toshiba has quite a racket with these recovery disks. It’s $25 for a new set. I wasn’t about to go that route.

I booted freedos off a CD and made sure all the partitions on the drive wiped before attempting a new recovery, With a raw drive, I attempted the recovery again, using the recovery disk to setup the partitions. It failed again.

At this point I was frustrated. I also think Vista sucks. I re-wiped the drive with freedos and attempted an install of windows 7 32-bit. It is what I had laying around. It failed with a “cannot install on this hardware error.”

At this point I knew something was up. I then ran CHKDSK on the drive and it took damn near 8 hours to complete. I ran the recovery and it failed again.

So extremely frustrated, I put a spare SATA drive in it, and ran the Vista recovery disks.

After about 14 hours of attempted recovery, the OS came to life. So error 10-FC12-0017 on a Toshiba recovery, is a bad hard disk. Save yourself the trouble and just replace the HDD.

What is most frustrating about this is the touchpad never did work, it was bad. The owner opted for an external mouse instead of paying to fix it. It didn’t work during the recovery. That should have been my clue that more hardware (like the HDD) could be damaged.

And that is one of the lessons I learned. The other lesson is, check the disk before running a recovery (something I normally do anyway for computers I don’t know the drive’s history). The third lesson is never detour from your usual practices because you are doing a favor for someone.

I hope someone finds this helpful.

Also, if you aren’t reading this at http://beavmetal.blogspot.com, you should be.

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Download Youtube(and other) videos and batch convert them to mp3

2010-05-03T01:56:00.001-05:00

This is a quick article on how to download videos from youtube (or any other supported site) and batch convert them into mp3 files.

First, how do you get the videos downloaded from youtube? I use the software from http://www.downloadhelper.net/ . It is a Firefox plug in. Unfortunately, I have not found a Chrome equal. SO I used Firefox for this task.

Using Download Helper, you just select download from its toolbar when you find your desired video. You can select between flv and m4p file types. I choose flv as personal preference.

Now the real reason for writing this, step 2: converting the video to a mp3. I spent a portion of today trying out freeware that is supposed to do this easy task. It all pretty much angered me. Let me tell you what I tried so you don't go down the same path:

Freez FLV to MP3 - Not Free, can use once before getting a registration prompt. If you don't register, the program closes. It also wouldn't batch encode more than 30 items.
FLV2MP3.org - It kept giving me 0 byte mp3 files.
A file from richapps.de: It wasn't a batch converter.

The program I ended up using, was VideoLan player. It is an absolute favorite program of mine. There is no batch conversion feature of VideoLan. However, a quick and dirty BAT file will do the trick. I found the following code on the videolan help wiki and changed it for flv files.

Create your BAT file (How to create a bat file) in the top most directory where you downloaded your FLV files. I plan to use this frequently so I called mine vlanFLV2mp3.BAT. It will convert all the files in that directory and in all the sub-directories below it. For instance, if you downloaded the flv files into C:\Documents and Settings\MYPC\Desktop\FLV and then have sub-directories of musical artists, you would want the BAT file in that top ..\Desktop\FLV directory.

Here is the code you need to past into the BAT file:



@ECHO OFF

REM ########################################################################

REM # A Windows XP cmd.com script to batch convert flv files to mp3.       #

REM #                                                                      #

REM # Copyright (C) 2008 Andrew Boden                                      #

REM # (boden@graduate.uwa.edu.au)                                          #

REM #                                                                      #

REM # This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify #

REM # it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by #

REM # the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or    #

REM # (at your option) any later version.                                  # 

REM #                                                                      #

REM # This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,      #

REM # but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of       #

REM # MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the        #

REM # GNU General Public License for more details.                         #

REM #                                                                      #

REM # You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License    #

REM # along with this program.  If not, see .#

REM #                                                                      #

REM # Version 1.0 (June 27th 2008)                                         #

REM # Uses VideoLAN VLC 0.8.6h (www.videolan.org)                          #

REM # Gracefully handles commas and apostrophes in file names.             #

REM # Not aware of any other characters needing graceful handling.         #

REM # 512kbps encoding with 44100 sampling.                                #

REM ########################################################################



@ECHO OFF

FOR /R %%G IN (*.flv) DO (CALL :SUB_VLC "%%G")

FOR /R %%G IN (*.flv.mp*) DO (CALL :SUB_RENAME "%%G")

GOTO :eof



:SUB_VLC

SET _firstbit=%1

SET _qt="

CALL SET _newnm=%%_firstbit:%_qt%=%%

SET _commanm=%_newnm:,=_COMMA_%

REM echo %_commanm%

CALL "C:\Program Files\VideoLAN\VLC\vlc" -I dummy -vvv %1 --sout=#transcode{acodec="mp3",ab="512","channels=2"}:standard{access="file",mux="raw",dst="%_commanm%.mp3"} vlc://quit

GOTO :eof



:SUB_RENAME

SET _origfnm=%1

SET _endbit=%_origfnm:*.flv=%

CALL SET _newfilenm=%%_origfnm:.flv%_endbit%=.mp3%%

SET _newfilenm=%_newfilenm:_COMMA_=,%

COPY %1 %_newfilenm%

DEL %1

GOTO :eof



:eof

This is the original code, it might be easier to copy. Remember to change m4a to flv if using the linked code.

If you already have all of the software, it isan easy 2 step process. 1: download all the videos you want. 2: run the bat file.

ICVERIFY 4.0 - user manager - admin password issues

2010-04-21T06:00:00.001-05:00

I am posting this because I couldn't find a solution to the problem online while I was working with ICVERIFY 4.0. It is a relatively dated program used to process credit cards. Basically it is just a GUI on top of a few SQL databases.

In the past, if some one changed or lost the admin password to the user manager and forgot it, deleting the UserDB files from the SQL directory and reinstalling the app cured the problem.

However, yesterday, I was doing a new install on a XP machine. I choose a custom user name and password for ICVERIFY, as is an option, then completed the install. When I went to open ICVERIFY, it thew back an error saying invalid user name password. After making sure I wasn't making a typo, I tried the default password and it didn't work. Neither password would let me into User Manager either.

So I did as above, deleted the database files, uninstalled user manager, rebooted, then reinstalled. I tried to let it use the default login info this time. I kept getting errors saying invalid login basically.

There was a great deal of trial and error after that. I won't go into it. However, my fix is the following: Uninstall ICVerify, User Manager, and the MSDE. Go into Windows Explorer and delete the ICverify data, and the SQL data. Use Regedit, to remove any instance of ICVERIFY, UserDB, and the SQL path.

Now, I was using a user account that was set as a local admin. But after removing all that info, I went into my actual local admin account and reinstalled everything. Worked fine for all users on the machine after that.

Last note, don't bother with calling their tech support line anymore. I called today and once about 3 years ago. Prior to today, I got a English speaking person who was well acquainted with the software and solved my problem quite quick. Today, the tech support number got me to what was obviously a 3rd party, English as a second language shop. Dude actually made it worse poking around turning off services and crap. When he couldn't solve the problem, he gave me the "Oh you don't have a 2nd tier support contract, please buy one to continue" speech.

Anyway, I hope this helps someone out there.

Have old Books, VHS, DVD, CDs, Cassettes, or computers you need to get rid of?

2010-04-21T02:30:00.000-05:00

Do you have old Books, VHS, DVD, CDs, Cassettes, or computers you need to get rid of?

I have been involved with book redistribution/recycling most recently. But I can also make sure other old media you want out of your house gets the love it deserves. It won't end up trashed or pulped (unless it's authored by Rush Limbaugh). I'm happy to come pick it up if you are in a 60 mile radius from me (Springfield-ish area).

I can also make sure your old computer gets either a new life or properly recycled.

Let me know if you have some stuff you don't want. I love transforming unwanted items into a good day for someone. :)

Did you notice

2010-04-01T12:00:00.001-05:00

Did you notice that I added some tabs right below my logo on this site. I recently started selling books on Amazon.com and am still selling on cafepress.com. I also have books to trade on swaptree.com and titletrader.com. I have added links to each of those in that section. Please check them out. If you are a member of any of those, leave your link in the comments :)

Shooting - Antique Shotguns and 22's

2010-04-01T11:00:00.001-05:00

I went shooting last week. My dad gave me an old 22 single shot rifle and I've been dying to see how it shoots. My cousin Steve and I loaded up a small arsenal in my trunk and headed over to Vandalia Tactical. Between us we had 3 old rifles/shotguns, a derringer, and a compact 25. Vandalia Tactical is a really nice range. They have a load of guns, ammo, and accessories for sale. They are not the cheapest on ammo. Can't blame them though, if I had a range, I'd make sure my prices were higher on ammo too. They weren't super high, maybe a dollar 2 or higher than elsewhere. It did make us decide not to shoo the two 25 caliber hand guns we brought with us.

Also, if you need pink 38 rounds, they have them. Yes, I said pink. Nothing pisses off a macho bad guy more than getting snuffed by a girlied-up bullet. Although, putting pink on a 38 round is like putting a dress on a MMA champ. All looks aside, it'll still take you out.

Having never shot a shot gun, I wanted to have at those first. I'm a pretty good shot, even with the first round. There is a definite difference in kick between the short brass and the long brass cartridges. Couldn't tell a difference in the carnage to the target though. We shot a single shot and a 4 +1 pump shotgun. The single shot was an antique in that it was over 30 years old. It kicked like an angry mule, but was accurate as hell.

We moved to our antique 22 next. His was a store branded Mauser and mine was a Sears & Roebuck branded rifle. Both shot really well. They were like cap guns compared to the shotguns. I was more accurate with mine (even though it hadn't been fired downrange in 30+ years) because it was a slightly shorter and easier to wield barrel. Both had excellent grouping (for my shooting skill), but the sights were a bit. We were both glad they didn't blow up in our faces.

The old shot gun left a huge bruise on my shoulder though. It was worth it. The whole day was fun.

Attack of the lady bugs

2010-04-01T10:00:00.000-05:00

My place has an enclosed front patio that leads to the front door. Yesterday, As I was leaving to run errands, I noticed hundreds (no exaggeration) of lady bugs on the walls and ceiling of my enclosed patio. It was quite a sight. A creepy sight.

Luckily, I had a spare bug bomb. I had been away all day and came home to find them all all the ground. The bug bomb worked. I feel kind of guilt of lady bug genocide. I will have to vacuum the up tomorrow.

I did snap a pic when I got home. It kind of sucks, but:

You really can't see the sheer number of them. There are probably 5 every square inch. There are all basically in a 5 foot by 6 foot area. so thats like 1800 lady bugs. (5*6*12*5). That translates into a bunch of vacuuming.

I can only imagine it was the warm weather yesterday (Wednesday) as they were not there Tuesday.

Any thing weird like this happen to you?

Stand By Me - the 30 Yr old version

2010-04-01T09:00:00.003-05:00

After all the rain and snow melting, most of us in the area noticed the Mad River at significant levels. Some of the carnage from high, fast water is big log jams. I had been driving past one near Aaron's Canoes (off upper Valley) for a couple of days and wanted to check it out. Daniel and Dusty were there with me. It just so happened the log jam wasn't as interesting as the bridge it collected around.

The pictures don't do the size of the jam justice. It was not however, as interesting as the abandoned railroad bridge the logs had clumped upon.

This is the entrance to the bridge

Just past the overgrowth, you see this. Notice the missing ties, slippery moss, and rotted wood ties.

This is our Stand By Me shot

And onto the tracks we go. I enthusiastically led the way, like a dumbass.

This is about halfway. We had already encountered severely loose boards, ties so rotted the squished under your step, slippery moss, and missing ties.

However, we were all surprised to see this:

It is a memorial to someone who died there. It is a little caboose and a crayon colored picture of St. Mary with a poem/prayer on it. It was definitely creepy. Especially on the grey, rainy day we chose. It is easy to see how someone falling off the bridge could get caught up in the debris. It is also easy to see how someone with smaller feet than me could tumble over. Especially, if they were as fearless of a teenager as I was.

I certainly felt more respect for the situation than I would have 10 years ago. I also put more stress on the rotten ties than I would have 10 years ago...damn donuts.

This is us heading back as the rain picked up. You can't tell from the picture, but it's a longer walk than it looks.

These were all taken with my cell phone. I'm really glad I didn't drop it.

Buck Creek Springfield Kayak Playground = Cool

2010-04-01T08:00:00.000-05:00

So after Hooters Dan said we should go checkout the kayak playground being built in Springfield. I guess they have built one of several play spots so far. This one is behind the Springfield Art Museum (Yeah, I didn't know they had one either). We didn't have our kayaks with us, so we didn't get to play. Plus it was cold.

The pictures don't do it much justice. The first slope goes into a hydraulic that was bigger than I expected.
These pics are of that.

This pic shows the slope into the hydraulic and the eddy that follows. I am standing next to the 2nd slope into another smaller hydraulic.

It's a 6-8 foot slope at approximately 30 degrees into about a 3 foot tall hydraulic. It looks like so much fun.

This is to give you some sense of perspective. I'm standing at the top of the slope.

This is the 2nd hydraulic. It is only about a foot or so high with a smaller lead in slope. there is also a decent sized eddy beyond it. The next, unfinished part is just down the river a bit.

I was quite impressed. I am also going to have to get a whitewater kayak to play in it. My touring/fishing kayak would probably flip in the first hydraulic. I did notice a decent amount of trash swirling around in the backwater between the eddy and the faster water to the next slope. I hope there are volunteers to clean that up. It could become gross real quick. Furthermore I hope people respect the area enough to keep trash out of the water.

I applaud Springfield and the efforts of everyone involved. I certainly hope to get out to it and play around.

Daniel 32nd B-day at Hooters

2010-04-01T07:00:00.001-05:00

Just wanted to post some embarrassing photos of Daniel getting sung too at Hooters. The sweet girls there made him some balloon hooters and made him shake them while they sang. It was quite funny!.

Happy Birthday buddy. Glad it was hooterific.

Healthcare related Non-cash charges in the news, quick explanation. Total corporate BS.

2010-04-01T06:00:00.001-05:00

So if you have read or sen the news lately, you have heard about the companies taking a non-cash charge as a result of the healthcare reform bill. The way this is worded is to intentionally mislead you into thinking this is a bad thing. At first glance (or vocalization), it sounds like healthcare is costing these companies revenue. That's not exactly the case.

For those who want to know what a non-cash charge is, from investopedia.com:

A charge off, made by a company against earnings, that does not require an initial outlay of cash. Non-cash charges are typically against the depreciation, amortization, and depletion accounts on a company's balance sheet. Companies take these charges against earnings due to extraordinary circumstances such as accounting policy changes or significant depreciation of asset's market value. Any sort of charge will usually result in lower earnings in the period when the charge was made. Sometimes also referred to as a write down.

So basically, they are taking a huge upfront expense. Yes, it lowers the earning. It is intentional. Lower earnings means less taxes to pay. I have a hard time believing the amount of money companies are posting as non-cash charges are nearly as big as they state. My gut feeling is that these companies are taking full advantage of a new law that has unclear business repercussions. Please don't feel sorry or worried about these companies. My understanding is that most companies won't feel the effect of health care reform until at least two years down the road.

Maybe we should worry about companies not smart enough to game the system. As we shouldn't be surprised that big companies don't like to pay taxes. Even though if they played straight, the extra tax revenue could really help the country.

My basic point here is these non-cash charges are strategic moves by these companies, not indicators that the sky is falling.

FYI, some of the companies the have huge write downs are:
Ingersoll : 41 million
AT&T: 1 Billion
Honeywell: 13 Million
3M: 90 Million
Boeing: 150 Million
AK Steel: 31 Million

I don't know the corporate tax rate for those companies, but these write downs cost the USA taxes on 1.325 Billion dollars. I'm sure that would've helped more than my measly amount.

Quick note.

2010-04-01T04:45:00.000-05:00

Please notice that I added some tabs right below my logo on this site. I recently started selling books on Amazon.com and am still selling on cafepress.com. I also have books to trade on swaptree.com and titletrader.com. I have added links to each of those in that section. Please check them out. If you are a member of any of those, leave your link in the comments :)

Dear Daniel, this article is for you.

2010-03-19T22:46:00.000-05:00

My friend Daniel thinks poop and farts are the funniest thing on the planet. Other than stupid people getting schooled, I tend to agree. This article is for you Daniel. Go ahead, Click the link already.

Anyone Else addicted to Territory War Online?

2010-03-19T13:00:00.001-05:00

The game Territory War Online is a simple turn based stick figure assault. You build your team very simply by picking names and hats. Then you play against other people worldwide while trying to eliminate their stick figure team first. It amuses me greatly. Anyone else play? What's your handle?

My Art: Abstracts

2010-03-19T12:00:00.001-05:00

Let me preface these photos with a few things:
1.) The photographs aren't great. I had to use a flash
2.) The flash hides alot of the finer details, color, and texture
3.) They were made specifically for the wall/room I am hanging them in.
4.) Please ask questions or leave opinions in the comment section

These first 2 took decent pics. There is still alot of detail missing from the pics.

The flash really took out some detail and hides the texture.

You really can't see the details of the colors due to the flash.

These next two are still drying, so I will have to show them off once they are on the walls.
I like how this one turned out. I was worried while it was wet because the colors weren't layering like I wanted. It is really going to look on my wall.

The flash really distorted this one. The reds are hidden and so is the texture. Will report once it's dry and on the wall.

Question: Local artists, where is the best place to get supplies?

2010-03-19T11:00:00.002-05:00

Dear Springfield/Dayton/New Carlisle artists,

Where do you find the best prices on art supplies? Specifically, Stretched Canvas framed around wood, acrylic paint, spray paint, and oil paint.

I have found 18" x 24" stretched canvas at Big Lots for $7. Smaller sizes are cheaper. I'm no expert, but they work great for me. Anyone know where to get them cheaper? I don't really want to make them myself.

I get spray paint at Walmart or Meijer. It's a couple bucks a can I think.

I haven't really found a spot for quality discount acrylics/oils. Any ideas?

Please comment with your thoughts/info.

New Carlisle, OH McDonald's sucks after 11:30pm-ish

2010-03-19T10:00:00.000-05:00

I have pulled up to the drive-thru at the New Carlisle McDonalds after 1130pm about 3 times over the last month. It is a 24 hour, 7 days a week facility. All three visits, varying in time from 1130pm to 230am, I was told they were accepting cash only. I was also told they stop serving ice cream and shakes after midnight. Furthermore, the employees have some attitude.

I was willing to write off the cash only as maybe running the daily reports. The more I thought about it, the more I realized McDonald's is to smart to have a system that needs to be taken down to close out the day. Computers would just need the date/time stamp and the associated data. The machine wouldn't care about any data after a given threshold.

Then I was just annoyed that a 24 hour facility would consistently take part of their machines offline. If it is for cleaning, why wouldn't they clean them during breakfast?

Lastly. as a fat guy, I visit many McDonald's. I have always thought the ran their businesses very intelligently. From customizing decor and menus to local tastes while maintaining a global standard to moving to older, more experienced employees, and everything in between. Some of the friendliest cashiers have been at McDonald's. The New Carlisle store is an exception after the lobby closes. Ya'll may wanna find some new third shifters.

//Rant over.

Kmart shipping silliness

2010-03-19T09:00:00.029-05:00

So I recently got a good deal on shoes at Kmart, via Kmart.com. The shoes were good quality and dirt cheap. The rarely have my size in stores, so I check out the selection in store, then order offline.

They were marking down lots of shoes, and having a buy one get one half off. I ordered 6 pairs of shoes, for about 10 dollars apiece.

They all shipped together in the same box, they were all the same size, a size 13. I received 5 adult pairs of 13's and 1 kids sized 13.

I am pretty sure I made the mistake on the website as the sizes came up in a different order than the other 5, but I was shopping in the adult male section. My question to the guy packing these shoes is, did you even stop to think why a kids shoe the numerically the same as 5 adult shoes were shipping together? Could you have called?

I know the answer is no. I bet the majority of the fulfillment is automated. However, computer foul ups like this is why I never worry about the Terminator scenario playing out. At some point, Skynet will parse some misinformation and build all the terminators to 1/52 of actual size.